It was pouring rain when the Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance arrived at the constituency office of Lisa Beare, Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture, but the sky opened up, and we enjoyed the sunshine as we drummed and sang songs in honour of wild salmon. We were honoured to be joined by Roxanne Ksan of the Ojibway Nation, and many other supporters. Hundreds of people travelling by honked their horns in support of our call to remove open net-pen fish farms from the migration routes of wild salmon. We certainly caught the attention of Minister Beare who came out and spoke with Eddie about our grave concerns over the blood waters from farmed salmon processing plants that continue to spew pathogens directly into the migration routes of salmon fry. Eddie also informed the Minister that fish farm licenses should not be renewed in June until the government has embarked on a process of meaningful consultation with affected First Nations, which have not given their consent to have the fish farms in their territorial waters and are demanding they be removed. The Wild Salmon Defenders will continue to rally at MLA and MP offices until they move the open net pen salmon farms onto land containment as is already happening in Washington state, Oregon, California and Alaska.
We delivered the following letter to the Minister: